Hope quotes
Lines for the morning after a bad night. Quotes about hope and looking forward, from Psalms to nineteenth-century novelists, sorted so the most-quoted come first.
The library has 461 quotes on this topic. Here are 60 of the most quoted, no more than four from any one writer.
60 hope quotes
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In hope to merit heaven by making earth a hell.
Lord Byron Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage, Canto i. Stanza 20 -
True hope is swift, and flies with swallow’s wings; Kings it makes gods, and meaner creatures kings.
William Shakespeare Richard III, Act v. Sc. 2 -
Such partings break the heart they fondly hope to heal.
Lord Byron Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage, Canto i. Stanza 10 -
And be these juggling fiends no more believ’d, That palter with us in a double sense: That keep the word of promise to our ear And break it to our hope.
William Shakespeare Macbeth, Act v. Sc. 8 -
Where peace and rest can never dwell, hope never comes That comes to all.
John Milton Paradise Lost, Bk. I -
Hope springs eternal in the human breast; Man never is, but always to be blest.
Alexander Pope Essay on Man, Epis. i., Line 95 -
You pierce my soul. I am half agony, half hope.
Jane Austen Persuasion, 1817 (Captain Wentworth’s letter) -
The miserable have no other medicine, But only hope.
William Shakespeare Measure for Measure, Act iii. Sc. 1 -
So farewell hope, and with hope farewell fear, Farewell remorse; all good to me is lost. Evil, be thou my good.
John Milton Paradise Lost, Book iv. Line 108 -
Prosperity is not without many fears and distastes; and adversity is not without comforts and hopes.
Francis Bacon Of Adversity -
’Tis hers to pluck the amaranthine flower Of faith, and round the sufferer’s temples bind Wreaths that endure affliction’s heaviest shower, And do not shrink from sorrow’s keenest wind.
William Wordsworth Weak is the Will of Man -
Thy wish was father, Harry, to that thought.
William Shakespeare Henry IV, Part 2, Part II. Act iv. Sc. 5 -
Maidens, like moths, are ever caught by glare, And Mammon wins his way where seraphs might despair.
Lord Byron Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage, Canto i. Stanza 9 -
The strongest and the fiercest spirit That fought in heaven, now fiercer by despair.
John Milton Paradise Lost, Bk. II -
O dark, dark, dark, amid the blaze of noon, Irrecoverably dark, total eclipse Without all hope of day!
John Milton Samson Agonistes, Line 80 -
Nor less I deem that there are Powers Which of themselves our minds impress; That we can feed this mind of ours In a wise passiveness.
William Wordsworth Expostulation and Reply -
One in whom persuasion and belief Had ripened into faith, and faith become A passionate intuition.
William Wordsworth The Excursion, Book iv -
Hope springs eternal in the human breast: Man never is, but always to be blest. The soul, uneasy and confined from home, Rests and expatiates in a life to come.
Alexander Pope Essay on Man. Epistle i, Line 95 -
For modes of faith let graceless zealots fight; His can’t be wrong whose life is in the right.
Alexander Pope Essay on Man, Epis. iii., Line 303 -
Whose faith has centre everywhere, Nor cares to fix itself to form.
Alfred Tennyson In Memoriam. xxxiii, Stanza 1 -
The desire of the moth for the star, Of the night for the morrow, The devotion to something afar From the sphere of our sorrow.
Percy Bysshe Shelley One Word is too often profaned -
She wore far too much rouge last night and not quite enough clothes. That is always a sign of despair in a woman.
Oscar Wilde Miscellaneous Aphorisms -
I am very little inclined on any occasion to say anything unless I hope to produce some good by it.
Abraham Lincoln June 29 -
I hope you have not been leading a double life, pretending to be wicked and being really good all the time. That would be hypocrisy.
Oscar Wilde Miscellaneous Aphorisms -
Our hearts, our hopes, are all with thee,—Our hearts, our hopes, our prayers, our tears, Our faith triumphant o’er our fears, Are all with thee,—are all with thee!
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow The Building of the Ship -
I held it truth, with him who sings To one clear harp in divers tones, That men may rise on stepping-stones Of their dead selves to higher things.
Alfred Tennyson In Memoriam. i, Stanza 1 -
Why should there not be a patient confidence in the ultimate justice of the people? Is there any better or equal hope in the world?
Abraham Lincoln September 8 -
I hope to be false to nothing you have been taught to expect of me.
Abraham Lincoln August 28 -
If they talked in this manner, they would in truth be attacking one of her pretensions. But I hope here to show that no reasonable person can speak thus, and I venture even to say that no one has ever done so.
Blaise Pascal Pensées, No. 194 · translated by W. F. Trotter -
Comfort yourselves. It is not from yourselves that you should expect grace; but, on the contrary, it is in expecting nothing from yourselves, that you must hope for it.
Blaise Pascal Pensées, No. 516 · translated by W. F. Trotter -
What will he do then, but perceive the appearance of the middle of things, in an eternal despair of knowing either their beginning or their end.
Blaise Pascal Pensées, No. 72 · translated by W. F. Trotter -
Curiosity is only vanity. Most frequently we wish to know but to talk. Otherwise we would not take a sea voyage in order never to talk of it, and for the sole pleasure of seeing without hope of ever communicating it.
Blaise Pascal Pensées, No. 152 · translated by W. F. Trotter -
Industry need not wish, and he that lives upon hope will die fasting.
Benjamin Franklin Poor Richard’s Almanack -
Do that which is assigned you, and you cannot hope too much or dare too much.
Ralph Waldo Emerson Essays: First Series -
Many as a matter of course even among his prescriptions are disagreeable, but we accept them in the hope of health.
Marcus Aurelius Meditations, Book V.8 · translated by George Long -
Look not mournfully into the past—it comes not back again; wisely improve the present—it is thine; go forth to meet the shadowy future without fear and with a manly heart.
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow -
Deal so plainly with man and woman as to constrain the utmost sincerity and destroy all hope of trifling with you.
Ralph Waldo Emerson Essays: First Series -
Propensity to hope and joy is real riches; one to fear and sorrow, real poverty.
David Hume -
By robbing Peter he paid Paul,… and hoped to catch larks if ever the heavens should fall.
François Rabelais Works, Book i. Chap. xi -
’Tis expectation makes a blessing dear; Heaven were not heaven if we knew what it were.
John Suckling Against Fruition -
A ship should not ride on a single anchor, nor life on a single hope.
Epictetus Fragments, Fragment XVI · translated by Hastings Crossley -
It happens as with cages: the birds without despair to get in, and those within despair of getting out.
Michel de Montaigne Book iii, Chap. v. Upon some Verses of Virgil -
There is a perennial nobleness, and even sacredness, in work. Were he ever so benighted, forgetful of his high calling, there is always hope in a man that actually and earnestly works.
Thomas Carlyle Past and Present -
Man is, properly speaking, based upon Hope, he has no other possession but Hope; this world of his is emphatically the Place of Hope.
Thomas Carlyle Sartor Resartus -
Without such shelter the followers of the “golden rule” may indulge in hopes of heaven, but they must reckon with the certainty that other people will be masters of the earth.
Thomas Henry Huxley Aphorisms and Reflections, No. CCXXXV -
How shall we hope that another person will keep our secret if we do not keep it ourselves.
François de La Rochefoucauld Maxims (supplement), Supplement, XVI · translated by J. W. Willis Bund and J. Hain Friswell -
We promise according to our hopes; we perform according to our fears.
François de La Rochefoucauld Maxims, Maxim 38 · translated by J. W. Willis Bund and J. Hain Friswell -
Maidens, like moths, are ever caught with glare, And Mammon wins his way where seraphs might despair.
Lord Byron Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage -
The Emperor Julian’s project was hopeful in comparison with the prospects of the Comtist Anthropolatry.
Thomas Henry Huxley Aphorisms and Reflections, No. CXLIV -
Do what you can to do what you ought, and leave hoping and fearing alone.
Thomas Henry Huxley Aphorisms and Reflections, No. C -
However deceitful hope may be, yet she carries us on pleasantly to the end of life.
François de La Rochefoucauld Maxims, Maxim 168 · translated by J. W. Willis Bund and J. Hain Friswell -
When fortune surprises us by giving us some great office without having gradually led us to expect it, or without having raised our hopes, it is well nigh impossible to occupy it well, and to appear worthy to fill it.
François de La Rochefoucauld Maxims, Maxim 449 · translated by J. W. Willis Bund and J. Hain Friswell -
The darkest day, live till to-morrow, will have passed away.
William Cowper Needless Alarm -
Let one unceasing, earnest prayer Be, too, for light,—for strength to bear Our portion of the weight of care, That crushes into dumb despair One half the human race.
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow The Goblet of Life -
’Twas but a dream,—let it pass,—let it vanish like so many others! What I thought was a flower is only a weed, and is worthless.
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow Courtship of Miles Standish, Pt. VIII -
Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that you may abound in hope, in the power of the Holy Spirit.
Bible (World English Bible) Romans, 15:13 -
Ere such a soul regains its peaceful state, How often must it love, how often hate. How often hope, despair, resent, regret, Conceal, disdain,—do all things but forget.
Alexander Pope Eloisa to Abélard -
Hope, like the gleaming taper’s light, Adorns and cheers our way; And still, as darker grows the night, Emits a brighter ray.
Oliver Goldsmith The Captivity, Act ii -
They that marry ancient people, merely in expectation to bury them, hang themselves in hope that one will come and cut the halter.
Thomas Fuller Holy and Profane State. Of Marriage -
He who believes in nobody knows that he himself is not to be trusted.
Berthold Auerbach